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Old 12-16-2009, 12:42 PM   #62
Elfwreck
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Posts: 5,187
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Join Date: Nov 2008
Location: SF Bay Area, California, USA
Device: Pocketbook Touch HD3 (Past: Kobo Mini, PEZ, PRS-505, Clié)
Quote:
Originally Posted by CCDMan View Post
Buy a book and if it is crap, it is YOUR PROBLEM. There are reviews, there are samples, and if you are in a bookstore buying paper you can sit down and read a bit. There is no excuse for returning books unless they are physically defective (unreadable formatting, missing content and such)
There are not always samples. (Amazon has them, but not every ebook seller does--and the samples may be in non-DRM'd formats when the actual book is Topaz.) There are not reviews of the *formatting* of ebooks, not in any coherent location.

Books received as gifts are not checked at the store. For that matter, when I go to the store to buy a book, I don't expect to need to flip through the pages to find out if the font is readable or the contents don't match the description--if it was mis-shelved in nonfic and was instead a novel, the bookstore erred in placement. Books advertised as Young Adult may contain content parents don't want their kids to have, which they don't discover until they read through them. A lot of stores object to people standing in the aisles and reading entire chapters at a time.

All that aside--books are no different from any other product. "It turns out I don't need this/already have one/don't have room for it" is all the explanation most stores need for returns; if it's in good condition, that's fine.

Ebooks should allow returns for
--bad formatting (missing punctuation, extra-wide margins, bad font/text size, OCR errors, lacks pictures included in paper version, Topaz, wrong metadata)
--file not usable with purchaser's software arrangement
--selected wrong filetype (for those that require 1 purchase per filetype)
--corrupt file

If the seller doesn't have previews, they should also allow returns for "started reading it and didn't like it." And "got this [coupon] as a gift; don't want it; exchange for different book please."

In a sane world, they'd allow "already have this in a different version/different publisher." Eventually, I think we'll see that--when enough ebook stores have open competition that customer goodwill becomes more important than the $3 profit from a single ebook.
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